Darkness
by bluesimageburgundy
Summary: Caroline meets The Ripper. Steroline. My take on how 6x15 could have gone down.


Silence pounded in his ears as time all but stood still. He could almost hear the paint creaking and peeling from the filthy walls of the run-down bar that surrounded them. The blood in his veins seemed to still, waiting for her to open those pretty, deadly lips and end this horrible nothingness that hung around them.

Stefan had just confessed his very real love to a very empty Caroline. And it had been painfully sincere and absolutely dripping with humanity. It was all he had left after trying everything else to try to get her back. And it was obviously going to be just as useless as everything else he'd tried, which hurt. Hurt him more than he had realized it would. The loneliness was driving him now, driving this desperation.

Finally, the sound returned. A little humorless giggle. Her boots crunching peanut shells, broken glass and the generic grime of the bar floor beneath them. The smile on her face as she approached him chilled him to his very core. It was beautiful in the way that a prowling tiger is beautiful. Eerily. Something that is completely aware of what it is. With blood sure to follow.

"Prove it," she said, her breath warm against his face. He could hear the stickiness of the blood on her lips. The skin of her arm brushing against him making him feel like he was standing on the outskirts of a wildfire.

"How?" he asked, his lack of hesitation frightening even to him. He would do whatever it took, it was clear to him now.

She, none-too-gently, grabbed a girl from the bar. The girl had been compelled to sit quietly and wait for her to turn to be fed upon. Stefan sucked in a shuddering breath as dread and excitement battled within him.

"Drink," she said, as casually as if she was handing him a beer.

Stefan searched Caroline's eyes for any sign of relenting, any sign that this was all a cruel joke. But, coming up empty, he took the girl from Caroline's grasp and wrapped his hands gently around her thin arms. His entire body was humming with anticipation. The girl's head lulled willingly to the side, revealing the dark blue veins of her neck, coursing with blood. Stefan gasped, hunger hitting him with the weight of nearly two centuries of addiction.

Caroline smiled and nodded in encouragement, her eyes wide with anticipation. Stefan glanced her direction for another moment, hoping to be pardoned. When her expression remained the same, he let it all go. Because he did love her. And she had to know. Somehow that was all that mattered to him now.

A false kind of relief shot through him as the girl's blood trickled down his throat. It was heaven and hell all at once and all for the woman he loved. He was taking it slow, making an honest effort at drinking without losing control. Telling himself to stop, but like the junkie he was, knowing it was a fruitless effort. His one hope was Caroline. She would stop him. She would save him just like always. That's what this was about, right?

The body in his arms was getting colder, going more limp by the second. When he sensed Caroline moving closer to him, he was relieved. She was going to stop him after all. But when she simply sunk her pretty white fangs into the other side of the girl's neck, Stefan knew it was over. All three of them were done for.

Stefan pulled away first with a jerk of his head and watched as the body hit the floor with a sickening thud. Caroline looked up from the body to him, blood dripping from her lips invitingly. He watched, mesmerized, as she ran her tongue across her lips and then hummed in pleasure at the final tastes.

She turned up one corner of her mouth in satisfaction. Whether or not she believed him wasn't clear, but she was clearly taking a sick pride at being able to control him in this way. After months of feeling so out of control as far as her feelings for him were concerned. Now she was in the driver's seat, where she preferred to be.

Stefan blinked at the body at his feet, trying to process what had just happened. Caroline stepped over the heap of skin and bones and wrapped her arms around Stefan's neck. His eyes shot up to hers, searching for rescue. But finding only encouragement, enabling, and desire.

Some part of him thought about resisting as her lips crashed into his, the part that wanted this to mean something more. But by the time her hot tongue slipped between his lips, that part of him was gone and only The Ripper remained. Ready to join her, this little enchantress now wound around him so tightly, and walk into the darkness together.


End file.
